Rachel GuillotFilm Annotation 7Flow
“Flow: For the Love of Water” was directed by Irena Salina and released in 2008. It focuses on water problems throughout the world with a concentration on the lack of clean water in certain regions and the privatization of water. It argues that water is the most valuable resource in the world and while some people take it for granted, others are struggling to survive. It is predicted that the next world war will be over water and we must change our habits and policies quickly in order to prevent this.
The matrix of sustainability problems drawn out in the film involves the lack of water, the fact that we are running out of fresh water, how we are disrupting the water’s normal cycle, the chemicals that we are putting into the water system so that when we take a shower, we are bathing ourselves in chemicals that are seeping into our skin, and vice versa, the chemical we have on our body from certain products [we are the experiments for chemicals] are washed off into the water and released into the environment. These chemicals in the water are causing infertility in fish and frogs and atrazine, found in a pesticide and the number one contaminant in the water is demasculinizing and feminizing frogs and fish and causing prostate and breast cancer in humans. The European Union has banned atrazine but United States organizations have not as a result of the connections between the EPA and influential atrazine corporations. Another major part of the matrix is the privatization of water. This privatization has been occurring mainly in 3rd world countries where the majority of the population cannot afford to pay for the clean water and thus is still drinking the contaminated water and getting sick from it. The corporations delivering the water are multinational, for-profit corporations such as Suez and Vivendi that have no vested interest in the poor people of the country. The governments of these countries are under pressure from the corporations to privatize otherwise they are threatened to be cut off from the World Bank. In La Paz, Bolivia, the free source of water is contaminated with worms and 1 in five children under five die from water poisoning. 208,000 people are excluded from the potable water system. In South Africa, a tablet can be bought to disinfect the water but many of the people cannot afford the tablet. Weeks on end go by with no water. The privatization of water has its own problems, they do not provide good services, the water is not always much better than the free, contaminated water, it comes a too high a cost, the instructions for use are in English which many cannot read, and the population has to pay upfront for their water which is culturally different from how they generally operate. There is also no education about the implications of the process. The water companies are created by banks and providing investor profit. Once the upper classes in a country get clean water, the government’s passion for the project dies. In the United States we take our water for granted and do not always treat out water sources with responsibly. Climate change is impacting our natural resources as well. The water cycle is changing with the melting of glaciers. Wells are drilled into old industrial sites, the World Bank is corrupted by water owners, the Ganges [one of the most important water sources in the world] is being privatized, people are forced to move so that dams can be built in the name of development then not compensated for their loses, and companies such as Nestle and Coca-Cola are taking natural resources from the people in an area then selling the products of these resources back to the people at many times the price. They are over-drawing the resources in the area they are located and the courts back them because of the influence they have over the governments.
The film did very well using images at all scales, worldwide, local, and microscopial. The graphics were very well done and as an architecture student who deals a lot in graphics, they can make or break an image or presentation. The font was carefully selected and color choices and the notes across the screen were very helpful for more factual information without being overly explicit in the verbal dialogue. The combination of natural noise and music worked well to create a flow to the film. The sequencing of the film and case studies from around the world strengthen its argument and focused the film on a world view that would allow it to be effective in more than one location. The sources, worldwide, researchers, activists, and authors were compelling and it was especially interesting to note the antagonists, the government and company officials who were pro-privatization. The images of nature are always especially interesting to me as a come from a very rural area and the film was very well put together and informative.
I was not particularly compelled by the subtitles, especially when the French man was speaking, I thought that either it should have been dubbed over [the rest of the text on the screen was all additional information] or the volume on his voice lowered so that one could read the text without being as distracted by the verbal accompaniment.
The audience this film was directed toward was very broad. The length of the film, about an hour and half was a disadvantage because it might lose interest of some younger students or not fit into class periods but I thought it would work well in an educational setting in middle and high school. It went into enough detail to be informative while also providing resources to find more information such as the groups and locations mentioned. Educationally, the film works well in a school setting; it can be shown at a community event as well because it is broken into segments and it is possible to watch a segment and gain knowledge from it and still not lose the overall value of the film without watching the rest.
As points of intervention this film proposes thinking outside the box. Conventional piping to everyone in the world is too costly and not feasible thus UV purification centers and filtration centers that are run locally are more financially viable and a self-sustaining option. Trapping rainwater where it falls [as in the film Garbage Warrior] rather than building dams is a viable option as well. The film mentioned a location where water harvesting was created by creating a channel between two hills bringing more greenery and prosperity to the region. The film encourages us to drink tap water where it is safe because it is a more sustainable option and often a safer option than bottled water. Education of the people in the regions where water cleanliness and scarcity is a problem is also a good intervention point. Peaceful foot marches, an insertion of political will, civil disorders, fixing aging infrastructure, community leaders, adding the Right to Water to the UN Declaration, creating local solutions, and the play pump [where children on a merry-go-round pump the water from a well to a holding tank] mentioned toward the end of the film are other alternatives to privatization of water.
In looking for further references on water purification systems I found a system called Aqua-Sun International, a solar powered water filtration and UV purification system that has options for wells, rivers, water sources both with and without water pressure, and can a be a community run and supplied source rather than just individual. I also attended a lecture/firm visit to/by Decker and Yeadon, an architecture firm located in NYC that uses a studio at Rhode Island School of Design to develop a water purification method that uses nanotechnology [carbon nanotubes] and can be used efficiently and cost effectively. Unfortunately I could not find published information on the project because it is an in-process student project. I looked more into Suez and found it interesting that they have two separate division, that of the water management and that of the energy and resource distribution. The water management website has designated pages for different types of people, individual shareholders, investors, journalists, and the general public, further presenting the segregation they encourage in a company that should be about freedom of resources. The website was also only translatable into French and English, while many of the people they serve do not have access to either of these languages.
“Flow: For the Love of Water” was directed by Irena Salina and released in 2008. It focuses on water problems throughout the world with a concentration on the lack of clean water in certain regions and the privatization of water. It argues that water is the most valuable resource in the world and while some people take it for granted, others are struggling to survive. It is predicted that the next world war will be over water and we must change our habits and policies quickly in order to prevent this.
The matrix of sustainability problems drawn out in the film involves the lack of water, the fact that we are running out of fresh water, how we are disrupting the water’s normal cycle, the chemicals that we are putting into the water system so that when we take a shower, we are bathing ourselves in chemicals that are seeping into our skin, and vice versa, the chemical we have on our body from certain products [we are the experiments for chemicals] are washed off into the water and released into the environment. These chemicals in the water are causing infertility in fish and frogs and atrazine, found in a pesticide and the number one contaminant in the water is demasculinizing and feminizing frogs and fish and causing prostate and breast cancer in humans. The European Union has banned atrazine but United States organizations have not as a result of the connections between the EPA and influential atrazine corporations. Another major part of the matrix is the privatization of water. This privatization has been occurring mainly in 3rd world countries where the majority of the population cannot afford to pay for the clean water and thus is still drinking the contaminated water and getting sick from it. The corporations delivering the water are multinational, for-profit corporations such as Suez and Vivendi that have no vested interest in the poor people of the country. The governments of these countries are under pressure from the corporations to privatize otherwise they are threatened to be cut off from the World Bank. In La Paz, Bolivia, the free source of water is contaminated with worms and 1 in five children under five die from water poisoning. 208,000 people are excluded from the potable water system. In South Africa, a tablet can be bought to disinfect the water but many of the people cannot afford the tablet. Weeks on end go by with no water. The privatization of water has its own problems, they do not provide good services, the water is not always much better than the free, contaminated water, it comes a too high a cost, the instructions for use are in English which many cannot read, and the population has to pay upfront for their water which is culturally different from how they generally operate. There is also no education about the implications of the process. The water companies are created by banks and providing investor profit. Once the upper classes in a country get clean water, the government’s passion for the project dies. In the United States we take our water for granted and do not always treat out water sources with responsibly. Climate change is impacting our natural resources as well. The water cycle is changing with the melting of glaciers. Wells are drilled into old industrial sites, the World Bank is corrupted by water owners, the Ganges [one of the most important water sources in the world] is being privatized, people are forced to move so that dams can be built in the name of development then not compensated for their loses, and companies such as Nestle and Coca-Cola are taking natural resources from the people in an area then selling the products of these resources back to the people at many times the price. They are over-drawing the resources in the area they are located and the courts back them because of the influence they have over the governments.
The film did very well using images at all scales, worldwide, local, and microscopial. The graphics were very well done and as an architecture student who deals a lot in graphics, they can make or break an image or presentation. The font was carefully selected and color choices and the notes across the screen were very helpful for more factual information without being overly explicit in the verbal dialogue. The combination of natural noise and music worked well to create a flow to the film. The sequencing of the film and case studies from around the world strengthen its argument and focused the film on a world view that would allow it to be effective in more than one location. The sources, worldwide, researchers, activists, and authors were compelling and it was especially interesting to note the antagonists, the government and company officials who were pro-privatization. The images of nature are always especially interesting to me as a come from a very rural area and the film was very well put together and informative.
I was not particularly compelled by the subtitles, especially when the French man was speaking, I thought that either it should have been dubbed over [the rest of the text on the screen was all additional information] or the volume on his voice lowered so that one could read the text without being as distracted by the verbal accompaniment.
The audience this film was directed toward was very broad. The length of the film, about an hour and half was a disadvantage because it might lose interest of some younger students or not fit into class periods but I thought it would work well in an educational setting in middle and high school. It went into enough detail to be informative while also providing resources to find more information such as the groups and locations mentioned. Educationally, the film works well in a school setting; it can be shown at a community event as well because it is broken into segments and it is possible to watch a segment and gain knowledge from it and still not lose the overall value of the film without watching the rest.
As points of intervention this film proposes thinking outside the box. Conventional piping to everyone in the world is too costly and not feasible thus UV purification centers and filtration centers that are run locally are more financially viable and a self-sustaining option. Trapping rainwater where it falls [as in the film Garbage Warrior] rather than building dams is a viable option as well. The film mentioned a location where water harvesting was created by creating a channel between two hills bringing more greenery and prosperity to the region. The film encourages us to drink tap water where it is safe because it is a more sustainable option and often a safer option than bottled water. Education of the people in the regions where water cleanliness and scarcity is a problem is also a good intervention point. Peaceful foot marches, an insertion of political will, civil disorders, fixing aging infrastructure, community leaders, adding the Right to Water to the UN Declaration, creating local solutions, and the play pump [where children on a merry-go-round pump the water from a well to a holding tank] mentioned toward the end of the film are other alternatives to privatization of water.
In looking for further references on water purification systems I found a system called Aqua-Sun International, a solar powered water filtration and UV purification system that has options for wells, rivers, water sources both with and without water pressure, and can a be a community run and supplied source rather than just individual. I also attended a lecture/firm visit to/by Decker and Yeadon, an architecture firm located in NYC that uses a studio at Rhode Island School of Design to develop a water purification method that uses nanotechnology [carbon nanotubes] and can be used efficiently and cost effectively. Unfortunately I could not find published information on the project because it is an in-process student project. I looked more into Suez and found it interesting that they have two separate division, that of the water management and that of the energy and resource distribution. The water management website has designated pages for different types of people, individual shareholders, investors, journalists, and the general public, further presenting the segregation they encourage in a company that should be about freedom of resources. The website was also only translatable into French and English, while many of the people they serve do not have access to either of these languages.